Working alongside creative coder Paul Hayes Persistent Peril created a miniature ‘dark ride’ that could be ridden live through the Oculus Rift virtual reality googles.

This was a hugely collaborative project in which we worked with some amazing local artists and technical creatives to bring this new experience to life. Illustrator Lucy Irving created wooden artwork of the giant goat, animator Mark Billington animated a loop which was projected in the cave, and animator Stew Harvey helped to design the track layout, goats and artwork the trees.

The environment, created using paper craft techniques, cut wood and lots of spray paint, tells the the abstract narrative of a demon goat. Beginning in an alpine forest populated by mountain goats, the train moves into a sinister cave. Here we see a goat staring into a glowing light who is then transformed into the goat beast. Exiting the cave we see the once lush forest decimated and stripped, and as we climb the mountain side goats are running away downhill. We travel across the top of the mountain to see that the cave is below an ancient altar of doom surrounded by bones. In the distance we can see the enormous cause of this destruction; a giant goat beast who finally devours us.

Participants of the event were first invited to take a look at the ride in person, waving and gesturing at the camera as it moved though the landscape. They could then go and ‘ride’ the train by putting on the Oculus Rift virtual reality googles, and see the ride from the trains perspective.

The train comprised of a GoPro camera and Kramer wireless HDMI dongle, mounted to a 1980’s Lego monorail system. The camera could turn to the points of interest through a series of commands sent to the Lego power functions components from an onboard Arduino. This footage was then streamed lived to a laptop hosting the Oculus Rift. You can read more about the technical aspects of the ride from Paul Hayes and Ginny on our blog.

The installation was hosted during the Brighton Digital Festival, at the wonderful Lick Yogurt Warehouse, over the course of three days in September 2014.

- THE RIDE -

A Stereoscopic version of the ‘Dark Ride’ designed to be viewed on the Oculus Rift, with fantastic Music by Simon James.